


Vulgar Tongue

by Meredydd



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Kink Meme Prompt Fill, M/M, m/m - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-17
Updated: 2013-04-17
Packaged: 2017-12-08 19:01:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/764911
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Meredydd/pseuds/Meredydd
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A fill for a prompt on sherlockbbc_fic, in which Sherlock may be amazing at many things, but American accents are not one of them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Vulgar Tongue

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by Benedict's rather...interesting...American accent in a recent film.

When Sherlock spoke French, John’s toes curled. When he spoke Italian, John was fairly certain that his heart skipped several beats. German made John’s stomach flutter, and Welsh...well, John never asked Sherlock just _why_ he spoke fluent Welsh, but he appreciated the fact that he did and that it made his voice extra rumbly. And the accents! John knew that he was in trouble the first time Sherlock used a pronounced Liverpudlian accent. It became a game when they were in public: John would feign being alone in a bookstore or Tesco’s or a pub and Sherlock would put on a character like a new suit of clothes, sidle up and ask for directions, or claim to have met John somewhere. It always, always ended up with John inviting the ‘stranger’ round to his for drinks... Then the two of them fairly racing back to their flat, buttons popping from shirts and zippers snagging all the way up the stairs.

It was a dull, wet Tuesday when Sherlock announced that they needed to go to the Bell and Whistle. Immediately. John looked up from his paper and barely managed to suppress a grin. “We do, do we? For a case?”  
“Of course,” Sherlock replied, one brow arching elegantly. “Why else would I set foot in a such a place?”  
John simply shrugged and went to get his jacket, noticing the two wine glasses set on the kitchen counter, awaiting their return.

The Bell and Whistle was noisy, smelled of spilled beer and cheap perfume, and seemed to favor bombastic 80‘s power ballads as background noise. John winced at the shriek of electric guitar cutting through the usual pub chatter and settled in to his position at the bar, awaiting whomever Sherlock was that evening. The whole thing had begun when Sherlock claimed it helped him keep his disguise skills sharp but... John huffed a small laugh. It had quickly become something else. Something that, even then, just thinking about it, made his cock twitch and his palms grow a bit damp. Taking a sip of his beer, he almost missed Sherlock taking the stool beside him. “Hi,” he managed on the tail of swallowing. “You look familiar.”

Sherlock smiled thinly and signaled the bartender for a drink. “Oh?” he asked, the single syllable somehow flat and nasal. “I’ve never been here before in my life.”

John winced, unable to stop himself. Sherlock’s frown showed that he had caught the gesture but there was nothing the doctor could do about that. The oddly elongated vowels were at odds with the harsh, almost guttural, consonants in Sherlock’s words. A very British ‘been’ mingled with an oddly twangy ‘here’ that somehow became two syllables and sounded, to John, like “he-ah”.

“Problem?” It came out as prow-blum.

“Sherlock,” John sighed, toying with the label on his bottle and trying his best to avoid his lover’s intense stare, “what on earth are you doing?”

“I’m not Sherlock,” he protested, brows snapping together in annoyance. “I’m Samuel. From America.” More long vowels, snapped off consonants. It sounded, John thought, as if Sherlock were doing an impersonation of John Wayne doing an impression of Jimmy Stewart.

“Well, Samuel from America,” John said, his lips twitching, “your accent is bloody awful.”

Sherlock fell silent for a very long moment, his frown deep and almost petulant. Before John could sigh, relent and ask for another demonstration just to soothe hurt feelings, the detective shrugged. “It’s a vulgar accent, anyway.”

“The way you do it, yeah,” John remarked, hiding his smile in a sip of beer. “It helps if you know what part of the States you’re aiming for,” he added in a deadpan Midwestern accent. “And if you actually know an American or two.”

Sherlock stared, wide-eyed, for two seconds before he leaned in close and breathed into John’s ear, “I’ve never done this before, but fancy coming back to my place for a drink? My flatmate’s out for the evening.”

John laughed. “Sure,” he replied in that same accent, silently blessing Corporal MacIntyre from the American medical unit in Kandahar for his unwitting help in getting him laid. “Lead the way.”


End file.
